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WANAFriday: a new-to-me author

This week’s #wanafriday blog prompt is: Share something cool that you’ve recently discovered with your blog readers. This could be a great book, a gripping TV show, a neat tip, an awesome recipe, or something else!

Many moons ago, I was waxing nostalgic about M. M. Kaye’s Death In… mysteries and bemoaning the fact that she’d only written six of them and I’d read them all. A blog reader (perhaps it was the lovely Ellen Gregory?) suggested I try Mary Stewart’s mysteries.

Now, I’d only ever heard of Mary Stewart because of her Merlin trilogy. I’d no idea she’d written romantic suspense (back before there was such a genre). Wanting to fill the Kaye-shaped hole in my reading life, I picked up her Airs Above the Ground.

And was hooked.

In short order, I tore through The Moonspinners, The Gabriel Hounds and My Brother Michael. I appreciate Stewart’s wonderfully evocative descriptions of her setting and her attention to details of the natural world. I enjoy her courageous heroines and her very manly men. It’s also interesting to note the way attitudes have changed over time, even in something as small and simple as the fact that people in her books smoke like chimneys!

I’m delighted to have discovered Mary Stewart’s mysteries and happy to recommend them to you. If you enjoyed Kaye’s Death In… books, you’re in for a treat with these!

Reader Interactions

Comments

Yes, it was me!! I am so pleased you’re enjoying all the Mary Stewart novels. She is definitely one of my all time favourites. I’ve read them ALL a gazillion times. They’re my goto books when I’m feeling like some comfort reading. 😀

Oh, yay! I was pretty sure it was you, but there was that 1% uncertainty there…

Which one(s) are your favorite? I’ve enjoyed all I’ve read so far, save for one that I could NOT get into and abandoned a few chapters in (I forget the title, but it had to do with impersonating a missing heiress).

The one you put down sounds like The Ivy Tree… I actually wrote a letter to Ms Stewart about that one, asking her a question, and received a very nice handwritten response, which I still have. (That was some 25+ years ago!) The book is actually worth persevering with, for reasons I can’t tell you.

My favourites… It’s difficult, because they keep changing over the years! I do love My Brother Michael and The Gabriel Hounds. Other favourites are This Rough Magic and Madam Will You Talk?.

Heading to the library today to check out Mary Stewart. Haven’t read anything (that I recall) of hers. Just finished reading several of Jodi Picoult’s books (Vanishing Acts, My Sister’s Keeper). I think I will check out a few more of her books.

I made dilly beans for the first time and really loved them. I just made another batch for my mother-in-law using this recipe (http://www.fermentersclub.com/dilly-beans/). We’ll test them in another day or two.